ChaiGuy’s blog

ChaiChai in Pakistan

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 07:17:27 +0100

I recently returned to Pakistan and me and Laura were wondering whether to start something for chaichai in Pakistan. Pakistan is an interesting place for tea consumption. Pakistanis like their tea strong, with milk and it should be very sweet. Also sales of organic products are on the rise here as more and more people become interested in the quality and health benefits of the foods they put in their stomachs. A number of organic outlets are springing up around the country in the larger cities. There is a certain type of customer in Pakistan that actually goes out and buys organic products because most people, as in the rest of the world, are usually concerned about price when they go out to buy products. I may be generalising here but a lot of people look at the price of an item before they decide to buy it. So we started thinking could chaichai's products sell in a market where organic products are not mainstream yet and also where people are very concerned about price. We have decided to test the market by pushing a very small number of products into the market and waiting to see what the result is. Will people buy our chai at our price point or is it too high, will people like the taste and strength of our tea and will people become repeat buyers? As with any product the answer to these questions will come in time. We'll keep you updated, keep drinking and enjoying your chai.

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My Journey into Social Networking

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 22:34:59 +0000

Recently I have started to get heavily involved with Social Networing websites. Hot and heavy if you catch my drift. The different types of social networking and social bookmarking sites out there is crazy. Now I have profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn, Bebo, Twitter, Digg and StumbleUpon.

Last week I hadn't even heard of Twitter or Digg. Slowly I have started to expand my social networking wings and after a few false starts I am soaring pretty well now. Years ago when everyone started to get on the MySpace bandwagon, I resisted getting a profile on any social website and I still don't have a MySpace page. Then Facebook came around and it was a huge phenomenon, it just didn't seem possible not to have a profile on Facebook. Facebook is great for ChaiChai too as we have a group for it and we also advertise on Facebook that drives a lot of traffic to our website.

After reading an article about Barack Obama having a Twitter profile, I had to see what all the hype was about. It is a great little site for telling your friends what you are up to and how you are feeling. But not so great for ChaiChai. LinkedIn is another good social website but again comes up short in the amount of people that are on it. People have flocked like crazy to Facebook. I would reccomend that anyone with a small business should get a Facebook page for their business. It is a great way to get some free marketing for your fledgling company. Also if you have some money for your advertising budget to spare, I would suggest advertising on Facebook, it is a great way to reach a very targeted audience for your products.

In the war for dominance of the social web world Facebook remains king, until something bigger and better comes along. The near future though looks likely to remain the time of Facebook.

Me trying to figure out social networking

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A fantastic Cafe in Edinburgh

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 22:16:41 +0000

While in Edinburgh this weekend, Laura introduced me to her favourite cafe in the city; a small cute place called Forest. It was a freezing day when we went looking for the Forest Cafe, and we had to wait outside for ten minutes before they opened. It turned out to be good because we got a chance to read what the cafe was all about. Basically it is a not for profit charity supporting local artists and being run by volunteers who also run a small arty cafe funding the whole thing. We thought that is a fantastic idea that everybody working in the place are volunteers from the local area, they work only on the tips of patrons of the Forest. Also at the front of the cafe is a free shop where people can donate anything they don't need and anybody can pick up anything they need from there. If anyone who reads this is in Edinburgh anytime please go and check it out it is located at 3 Bistro Place or check it out online at www.theforest.org.uk.

Forest Cafe

Me in the Forest Cafe

Laura outside the Forest Cafe

A real cool table

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Christmas and me

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 20:41:35 +0000

I love Christmas in the UK, it has the same atmosphere as Eid back home. I hope Christmas this year is like this:

Snow

Christmas is a little weird being a small business, because although I personally feel that it has become very commercialised it should be the best sales period for us. Every company in the UK is pushing hard for sales; slashing prices, advertising like crazy and adding to the cheese factor of the season. The one piece of advice I would give every small business out there is to be prepared for this festive season. Make sure your supplies are in order and you have enough stock to see you through the holidays. Also work really hard, but have fun while you do it. Even though this will be the craziest period of the year, don't go crazy yourself and try to enjoy this great time. We have gotten into the spirit ourselves by introducing a ChaiChai Christmas Gift Hamper (yahoo).

ChaiChai Hamper014

Have a great Christmas and a happy New Year and let me know how you plan to spend your holidays. See you next year.

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A small chai company and the credit crunch

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 22:18:37 +0000

Credit crunch

This entire credit crunch business is very depressing. Everyday you hear on the news that the situation is getting worse and it will be years before the economy rights itself again. For a small company like ChaiChai the whole situation is bad because unlike large companies we cannot decrease our prices or offer deals like buy one get one free or come out with large scale advertising campaigns. But what we can do is fight on and get through the recession with the determination that comes from being an entrepreneur.

In a recession, the first thing that people cut back on are luxuries and an indulgant product like chai isn't on the top priority shopping list for most people, but the way we will overcome this is to innovate, by introducing new flavours and trying harder to get the word out about our company and our products. Until next time, this chaiwalla will soldier on.

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Commerce

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 23:06:04 +0100

Selling anything is hard. We were told by retail outlets that our packaging did not fit in well in a retail setting, so we said ok no problem. We decided to update our labels on our packaging to stand out more. The new front sticker is shown below, let me know what you think of it.

Front sticker

This is to be the new look of our packaging. It isn't easy to be told that your packaging is plain and wont sell well in a retail outlet. But you take what ever someone tells you and you use it. Our packaging is clean and simple because it reflects us as a company, we try to use recyclable material in our packaging and our simple dull bags are sourced from sustainable forests and we try to use recycled filler material in our postal boxes. So if we need to freshen up the look of our labels that's what we did. Let us know what you think of the new look.

Chai for now.

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Our products

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 12:33:55 +0100

ChaiChai Together 1

Hi Chai fans,

On the left there are ChaiChai's two products, Masala Chai and Chocolate Chai. The journey to bringing an organic tea company to fruition has been tough to say the least but seeing the products in their final form is a great feeling. 2 people spending all of their time to make it all work has finally produced something worth selling. Now the real question is will people buy it or not, well I'll keep you posted on how it all goes.

Talk to you soon.

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How to make Chai

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 09:28:54 +0100

Hello chai fans.

I thought the other day that I had been going on about stuff but hadn't mentioned how me and Laura make chai. Ok here goes; I'm not saying this is the best way to make a cup of chai, but we feel this is the easiest and quickest way to get a very nice tasting cup.

What we do first is scrounge around for a small saucepan, if it has a small lip it is easier to pour out of (saves cleaning up the kitchen top later). Then we put about 2 cups of water in it (a 1/4 cup less than 2 cups) and then put in 2 teaspoons of ChaiChai's chai mix (we are smitten over our own Chocolate Chai mix) and 2 teaspoons of sugar in (you don't need to put sugar in it if you are sweet enough). Then we turn the heat on and bring the whole mixture to a boil. When it starts to boil (it will fill your kitchen with a fantastic smell of chai) add half a cup of milk to the mixture. Then wait for that to boil again and when that's done pour the mixture through a sieve into two cups and enjoy. We hope you try making chai for yourself and your family, it is a wonderful experience that everyone will enjoy.

Ok, see you next week.

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This Entry isn't Even about Chai

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 09:00:12 +0100

I'm a very straightforward guy. If I think someone needs to hear something I let them know. I don't mind too much about the consequences of my actions, because in business I feel people need to hear the truth, always. I love it when people grill me as well. Me and Laura got grilled today, it was about our cost, our packaging and our brand. I take all the criticisms that people throw my way as positive (ok most of the time I do). There is something you can learn from everyone, and the problem I have is that people don't like it when criticisms are thrown in their direction. If you tell someone, 'maybe you should try this instead of that', they can very easily take it the wrong way.

I think the point I'm trying to make here is that the words you choose in speaking to people when in business count a hell of a lot more than some would think. I think a person in the food and drink industry (or in any industry for that matter) needs to be able to take a lot of abuse about their product and about themselves and then needs to adapt their style of talking to people who they deal with (abusing people back as I have learned doesn't always help, it may feel great, but doesn't help). A different tone and style of langauge needs to be adopted for your suppliers and a different one for your customers. Again it all comes back to the fact that business is not easy, no matter what country you live in. People are the same and have the same problems wherever you go. An entrepreneur's skill comes in the ability to deal with those problems (who knows if any of this makes sense, I sometimes just ramble on and on and on and ... you get the point).

Until next time, chai for now.

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My First Cup of Chai

nobody@vox.com(ChaiGuy) — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 11:17:48 +0100

What makes a good cup of chai? Is it the ingredients, the way it is made or the skill of the person making it? The first time I made a cup of chai, it was dreadful. It was too watery, had too much spice mix in it and was basically undrinkable. Over time I got better, so much so that I feel that I can make a pretty mean cup of chai now, to even rival my grandmother's chai (who would probably clip me around the ear and tell me to keep practising). Me and my business partner Laura experimented with an old family recipe of chai that was floating around and added stuff to it, took stuff out of it and made it so that it would appeal to modern taste buds. We set up a little company around the recipe called ChaiChai and started making bags of chai to sell to people.

I feel and have felt for a long time that chai can only properly be made by being brewed on a stove. That is the only way you can get the true flavour of the tea leaves and the spices to fuse together to produce the wonderful and exotic chai taste. A lot of chai that is available on the market is in teabag form and that just doesn't work properly. The milk has to be brewed along with the tea and spices and cooked to produce the final drink, just as they do on the subcontinent. I am putting all this out there to find out what people have to say on this, maybe people make their own chai, it could be that people cannot wait for it to brew on a stove and prefer teabags or it could be that some hardcore fans of the drink (me included) only brew it on the stove and will not touch teabags. Let me know what you think about my blog or anything else about chai or even the big bad world of tea and let's see if we can get a discussion on the subject going.

Thanks and chai for now.

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